ACADEMIC SENATE MINUTES
April 15th , 2008
Attendance (X indicates present, exc indicates excused, pre-arranged absence)
Behavioral & Social Sciences
Brown, Maria
Rader, Emily - _________________X
Widman, Lance
excused
Wynne, Michael
X
Janet Young______________excused
Industry & Technology
Gebert, Pat_
Hofmann, Ed
X
MacPherson, Lee
X
Marston, Doug
Rodriguez, George
Business
Halamka, Dagmar
Saddiqui, Junaid________________X
Learning Resources Unit
Striepe, Claudia
X
Vince Robles________________X
Counseling
Beley, Kate
X
Gaines, Ken_________________X
Raufman, Lisa/V. Ragfold
Fine Arts
Ahmadpour, Ali
X
Davidson, Jason_________________X
Wells, Chris
___X
Crossman, Mark_
Health Sciences & Athletics
Hazell, Tom___________________X
Orton, Tory/Victoria (sharing)
Stanbury, Corey
Kim Baily (sharing)
McGinley, Pat (sharing)
Moon, Mary (sharing)
Humanities
Hong, Lyman___________
__excused
Marcoux, Pete
___X
Uyemura, Evelyn
___X
Kline, Matt____________________excused
Adrienne Sharp_________________ _X
Mathematical Sciences
Ghyam, Massoud
Kasabian, Judy_________________X
Scott, Greg
Tummers, Susan _________excused
Marc Glucksman
X
Natural Sciences
Cowell, Chas_________________ X
Golestaneh, Kamran____________X
Palos, Teresa
_X
Vakil, David
X
Adjunct Faculty
Kate McLaughlin
X
Owens, Annette
ECC CEC Members
Fleming, Art
Hoffman, August
Panski, Saul___
ALL CEC EXCUSED
Pratt, Estina
Smith, Darwin
Ex Officio Attendees: Francisco Arce, Jeanie Nashime,
Guests and/Other Officers: Barbara Perez, Stephanie Rodriguez
Unless noted otherwise, all page numbers refer to the packet used during the meeting, not the current
packet you are reading now.
The fourth Academic Senate meeting of the Spring 2008 semester was called to order at 12:35pm.
NOTE: There were not enough members present for a quorum. The Senate needs 23 members for a
quorum, and although 23 member names appear on the attendance sheet, some left early or arrived late, so
at one time there were not 23 members present. Therefore minutes were not approved and no voting took
place.
Approval of last Minutes:
No minutes were approved.
REPORTS OF OFFICERS
President’s report – Pete Marcoux (henceforth PM)
PM showed a flowchart of Academic Affairs Board Policies. It was noted that some policies are out of
date. Please look at the list and see if any policies in your area need updating. The list is accessible from
the Academic Affairs Web page. It was felt that the website contents may also need updating, for instance
there was a question about the Audit of Classes policy. Evelyn Uyemura felt that that had been reviewed
pretty recently. Kate Beley said it may have been passed by Senate but had perhaps got held up at Board
level.
PM introduced the last College Council meeting [see pg 6 of packet for Council Minutes] PM was unable
to attend the meeting, and there had been no meeting during the break. Dr. Nishime reported that team
reports had been given, and that there had been a Financial Aid Program review, and an update on the
Compton campus affairs. It appears that the Cosmetology Dept. at Compton had contracted with an
agency not eligible for Title V funds, and this is a cause for concern as the institution may be liable for the
monies. Dr. Arce reported that the North soccer practice field would indeed be temporarily paved over for
parking. This will be done over the summer in time for the Fall semester. Dr Arce reported that the
Accreditation Annual Report was due on Friday. Lars Kjeseth and Jenny Simon have prepared an SLO
report. The Accreditation Self- Study will be posted online today with the exception of Standard $, which
is still undergoing some editing. The report will also be posted on the VP Academic Affairs page. Click
on Accreditation 2008. These are public documents. Please look at the report and make comments. At the
Council meeting Dr. Fallo had reported on a visit by the Commission re: our accreditation team. No Chair
has been appointed for “our” team as yet. It appears that two teams will be coming. One to visit Compton,
and another to visit El Camino. It was felt to be very important that the teams have an understanding of
the ECC/Compton situation. Dave Vakil asked if we were not being funded as a multi- college district?
Dr. Arce replied that indeed we were, but we were not being viewed as such for the purposes of
accreditation. This is an unusual situation.
The State Plenary session will be held this weekend. PM will be attending. One can find all the
resolutions on the Senate website http://www.asccc.org/Events/sessions/spring2008/materials.html
On the Plagiarism memo [see pg 8 of packet] there was only one legal opinion from a law firm
representing the Chancellor’s Office. Evelyn Uyemura summarized the issue, which was whether faculty
could fail a students for the semester because of one plagiarism incident. The opinion said NO. Evelyn
Uyemura said that El Camino was trying to encourage a policy allowing teachers to give such students a
zero on the assignment. This was felt to be better than giving an F for the assignment. Ms. Uyemura also
urged faculty with real evidence of plagiarism to report the incidents to Harold Tyler’s office so as to
produce a paper trail that would allow the college to track patterns. This is consistent with Board Policy.
The benefit of the zero is that it is as if the student did not do the assignment. PM remarked that the
plagiarism site “Turn It In” had also found heavy plagiarism within medical journals.
Regarding the elections for the Senate President Elect. Mr. Wells will be handling these elections.
There is also some release time for the president Elect. May 6th is the last day for nominations, and the
election will be held on May 20th.
Accreditation Draft Reports are online, as noted earlier. PM called for volunteers to represent the
Senate views on the reports.
PM reminded everyone that it was the SLO Assessment Week [see pg 28-29 of packet]
Compton Education Center report - Saul Panski (SP)
Due to a meeting at Compton, the CEC members have requested to be excused.
Curriculum Committee report – Janet Young (JY)
JY is ill and excused.
Educational Policies Committee report – Evelyn Uyemura (EU)
BP & AP 4250 Board Policy on Probation & Dismissal (pg 13-14 of packet) – this should be the
second reading, but the procedures that should accompany the Policy were not included in the
packet, and as there is no quorum, the voting will have to wait until the next meeting.
EU noted that according to the College Council minutes the following policies would be going to
the Board at their next meeting: the Library Policy, the Textbook Policy, and the Catalog Rights
Policy. Dr. Arce requested that EU work on the Student Code of Conduct Policy, and a
Copyright for Faculty Policy. EU thought there had been a Committee on this earlier. Claudia
Striepe said there had been a Copyright Committee. EU thought that this might be the better term
and that perhaps this Committee might have some ideas/materials to share.
The committee will meet again on the 17th April at 12:45pm in Humanities 110..
Faculty Development Committee report – Dave Vakil (DV)
No meetings have taken place.
.
Finance and Special Projects/ PBC (Planning and Budgeting Committee) – Lance Widman (LW)
Excused. The points below will be discussed at the next Senate meeting.
 VP- Finance and Special Projects
 pp. 16-18, PBC 3/20 Minutes, discussion continued about the Preliminary Budget as well as the
application process and forms for the Special Contract Funding for 2008-09, which is the $3M
available to ECC as part of the EC/CC Partnership. The latter item was subsequently approved at
the PBC’s 4/3 meeting.
 There is nothing to report from the Council of Deans 4/3 meeting.
Legislative Action report – Chris Wells (CW)
CW gave an Area C Meeting update. CW reported that he had found some resolutions
interesting, like the one regarding online counseling, which is something El Camino offers.
There was also a resolution attempting to make the curriculum standard. There was another
resolution on Grading. There was a concern that 40% of students gets A’s for classes, and what
this meant for the perception of grades. Another resolution dealt with the issue of minors on
campus, especially as regards overnight field trips where inappropriate behaviors were reported
to have occurred. An issue under discussion was that of staying current on catalogs. It seems that
schools are now accepting the online catalog as the catalog of record. These are easier to update.
CW reported that fourteen (14) schools are on Accreditation probation or warning - some for
resisting the SLO process. There was discussion of large class sizes as fire hazards. Please
forward your opinions on these matters to PM who will be voting on the issues at the weekend’s
Plenary Session.
SPECIAL COMMITTEE REPORTS
No reports.
UNFINISHED BUSINESS
BP & AP 4250- Probation Policy
2nd reading – Vote next meeting.
Faculty Hiring Procedure
(pg 19 - 26 of packet)
Barbara Perez asked if there were any additional thoughts on this matter. Kate Beley asked if Dr. Perez
could make the changes previously discussed and agreed to before we got to the voting stage. Dr. Perez
agreed to do so. There was a question about the composition of the hiring panels. “The Dean picks three
hiring committee members. What happens if others want to be on the Committee, and how do they get
voting privileges?’ Dr. Perez said that three was the base number, and that more could be added. The
faculty of the department could decide how many people they wanted on a hiring committee. Normally a
committee is peopled via a Committee department.
Evelyn Uyemura noted that the heading for Section VIII should rather be Equal Employment Opportunity
Representative instead of Affirmative Action. Dave Vakil questioned the non mention of a confidentiality
statement and faculty committee member protection. Dr. Perez argued that this was part of the faculty
contract and we were covered by due process, therefore it would make no sense to include such a
statement. Mr. Vakil felt it should still be included. Dr. Perez agreed to include the information as an
attachment or appendix. Chris Wells asked whether the College posts positions on The Registry. The
answer was Yes. There was a question as to the status of the Intermediate Algebra position, and the reply
was that the position has been “greenlighted” for Fall 2009.
AGENDA ITEMS FOR NEXT MEETING:
PM announced that the next meeting would be on May 6th. Senate members will be voting on the
Probation Policy and Hiring Procedures Policy at that time.
Special Announcements:
PM appealed to members to look out for anyone who might be willing to serve on the PBC, as a matter of
some urgency.
The meeting was adjourned at 1:17 pm.
Cs/ecc2008